Raw Story (via the AP) is reporting that the Pentagon will order that 30,000 troops be sent to Iraq in early 2009 to ensure we maintain 15 combat brigades there through the end of next year.

WASHINGTON – The Pentagon is preparing to order roughly 30,000 troops to Iraq early next year in a move that would allow the U.S. to maintain 15 combat brigades in the country through 2009, The Associated Press has learned. […]

Overall, there are about 146,000 forces in Iraq, and that number is expected to dip to about 142,000 by mid-July when that last unit is all out. That total is at least 7,000 more than the number of troops in Iraq before the buildup began early last year.

Of course, this is the opposite of what CENTCOM Commander General Petraeus told Congress in May, when he suggested that he was “likely” to recommend further troop withdrawals from Iraq by the end of 2008.

(cont.)
So, in essence, one month after telling Congress further reductions were likely, Petraeus, despite the urgent needs we have in Afghanistan, and the so-called success of the “Surge” (if you can call this a success) has determined that we will need to maintain more troops in Iraq through the end of 2009 (the first year of the first term of the next President) than we had there before the Surge was implemented in 2007. How quickly things change. Remember last year this time when the press was reporting that the only issue our military leaders had among themselves was over the extent of the troop withdrawals that could be made post-surge?

The current U.S. emphasis may be on the surge in Iraq, but there are plans to start drawing down U.S. forces by the beginning of 2008, according to senior U.S. officials with knowledge of the planning. […]

[A] drawdown may begin in February 2008, although each of the two generals supports a slightly different plan.

Plan one, which officials say Odierno is pushing, would start with a drawdown of one brigade (5,000 troops) every month starting in February, with a reduction in troops from roughly 150,000 at present to 100,000 by December 2008.

Petraeus champions a slightly different approach that would cut the troops down to roughly 130,000 by the end of 2008, with further reductions the following year.

Ever feel like you’ve just been handed the deed to the Brooklyn Bridge while the guy walking away from you with your life savings is laughing his head off? Yeah, me too. The entire “surge” policy has been one big scam on the American people. It’s goal wasn’t to ensure that we could leave Iraq, or even lessen our role in Iraq. It’s real goal was to insure that we stay in Iraq for the next — oh — 100 years or so.

Now consider why someone is leaking this information regarding additional troops being sent to Iraq in 2009? Don’t they understand that the next President (and all signs currently point to the Democrat in the race, Barack Obama, being that President) can countermand those orders the day he enters office? What do they know about the future that they feel comfortable ordering more troops to Iraq in 2009? What knowledge of future events do they possess that assures them that whoever the next President may be, he will be unable to reverse this policy of a continuing large presence in Iraq?

Either they believe McCain will win, and agree to their plans (and that is what he has consistently promised he will do if elected), or they believe Obama will be so hamstrung by events in the Middle East as he enters office that he will be forced to acquiesce to the presence of 15 combat brigades in Iraq for the foreseeable future. And what could force Obama to maintain such high troop levels in Iraq despite the opposition of the American people and his own stated promise to reduce troop deployments there?

I think you know the answer to that question.